Armed Forces: Defence Medical Education and Training Agency

Lord Drayson: My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Derek Twigg) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	The following key targets have been set for the chief executive of the Defence Medical Education and Training Agency (DMETA) for the financial year 2007-08:
	Key Target 1—Deployable Personnel
	To meet 100 per cent of the Commanders-in-Chief requirements for secondary care personnel under DMETA command for operational deployments.
	Key Target 2—Individual Military Continuation Training
	To ensure that 90 per cent of all DMETA personnel whose medical category permits achieve their service's annual mandatory individual military training.
	Key Target 3—Medical Professional and Career Training
	To provide initial training (phase 2) that meets the requirements, professional standards and timescales defined by the single services.
	To provide career, professional and continuation training (phase 3) that meets the requirements, professional standards and timescales defined by the single services, and the statutory requirements of the relevant national bodies.
	Key Target 4—Efficiency
	To reduce the ratio of personnel engaged in support activities compared with direct activities.
	Key Target 5—Customer Focus
	To maintain the customer confidence index score within a stated range.
	Key Target 6—Harmony/Separated Service
	To ensure compliance with the single services' harmony guidelines for all deployable personnel under DMETA's command.

BNFL: AWE Management Limited

Lord Drayson: My right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (John Hutton) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	Further to the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry's announcement on 24 October 2006, (Official Report, col.85WS) regarding the sale by British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL) of British Nuclear Group (BNG) and establishment of a National Nuclear Laboratory, I would like to announce that BNFL has commenced the process to sell the group's one-third stake in Atomic Weapons Establishment Management Limited (AWEML). AWEML is currently owned equally by BNFL, Serco and Lockheed Martin. In addition to seeking to maximise shareholder return through the sale process, the Government and BNFL will seek to ensure that an AWEML consortium is in place to manage the enduring performance of AWEML's subsidiary, AWE plc, in continuing to meet the requirements of its customer, the Ministry of Defence.
	I will update Parliament on the progress of the sale at a later date.

Gambling: Casinos

Lord Davies of Oldham: My honourable friend the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport (James Purnell) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	In response to a Question from Andy Reed on 11 July, the Prime Minister said that during the summer we would look at whether regeneration may be a better way of meeting economic and social needs than the creation of regional casinos. I know that there is a great deal of interest in this issue across both Houses and beyond, and I am making this Statement to provide further detail to enable those directly involved to plan accordingly.
	The Gambling Act 2005 provides for the licensing of one regional, eight large and eight small casinos. The Government's national policy statement on casinos, published in December 2004, sought to accommodate the desire expressed by many local authorities to explore the potential economic and regenerative benefits of new casino developments within our overriding objective of keeping crime out of gambling, keeping it fair and protecting children and vulnerable people.
	In October 2005, my right honourable friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood established the independent Casino Advisory Panel to advise her on the authorities that should be given the power to issue the new casino licences. Sixty-eight local authorities applied to the panel, including 27 applications for the single regional casino. On 30 January, the panel recommended that Manchester should be permitted to issue the regional casino premises licence, and it recommended the 16 authorities that should be permitted to issue large and small casino licences.
	Having carefully considered the independent panel's report, and following consultation with colleagues in the devolved Administrations, on 28 March the Government brought before the House an order giving effect to the recommendations. That order was passed in the House of Commons by a majority of 24. It was, however, narrowly rejected by the House of Lords.
	The Government have reflected on the debates in both Houses. There are a number of important conclusions to be drawn.
	The first is that there was a clear consensus across all parties that the eight large and eight small casinos—the 16—should be awarded to the authorities identified by the Casino Advisory Panel.
	Since Parliament debated this issue, there have been local elections in many of the areas concerned. Some have experienced a change of political control, and in the remaining authorities some of the individual councillors involved in relevant decisions may have changed.
	Our reform of gambling policy has placed a great emphasis on the importance of local consultation and local accountability; we have given local people through their elected representatives a greater say in the licensing of gambling premises in their communities. This includes for the first time giving authorities the power to resolve not to license a new casino.
	Against this backdrop, I have decided to write to the authorities concerned to ask them to confirm their continued desire to license a new casino. I am sure that both Houses will wish to take account of a renewed commitment from the areas concerned when the time comes to consider this matter again. If any of the authorities have had a change of heart, I will not include them in the new legislation. The Gambling Act requires only that up to eight authorities in each category are identified.
	While there may have been broad agreement on the 16, it was equally clear that, as the Prime Minister made plain last week, there is no such consensus over the regional casino. Although much of the debate focused on the merits of the Casino Advisory Panel's recommendation of Manchester as compared to Blackpool, many Members of all sides of both Houses expressed serious doubts about whether we should have a regional casino at all. We have taken heed of those concerns.
	The Gambling Act, which is due to come into force on 1 September this year, introduces one of the most rigorous regulatory regimes anywhere in the world. It is why we enshrined at the heart of that legislation the three key objectives of keeping crime out of gambling, keeping it fair for the consumer and—our number-one priority—protecting children and vulnerable people.
	Later in the year, the independent Gambling Commission will publish a new study into the prevalence of gambling. This will provide updated information about the rate of gambling and problem gambling in this country. The gambling industry is on notice that if, despite the very stringent safeguards we have introduced, the incidence of problem gambling increases, we have taken the powers to introduce even tougher protections. I have also decided that it is right to pause and to wait for the results of the prevalence study to be published in September before reaching a decision on how best to respond to the decision of the House of Lords to defeat the casino areas order.
	The Government's overriding priority has always been to minimise the potential for harm arising from such developments. At the same time, we have wanted to respond positively to the significant number of local authorities keen to explore the potential of a regional casino to contribute to regeneration in their communities. That is why the new casino provisions were introduced in the first place. The need for regeneration in east Manchester was a significant factor in the success of the city's application to the Casino Advisory Panel.
	In view of the very real concern surrounding the regional casino, it would be prudent to examine afresh whether deprived areas can be equally well served by other forms of regeneration. The Government are taking forward this issue.
	In the mean time, we are proceeding with the urgent task of completing the implementation of the Gambling Act. Protecting children and consumers is our number-one priority. I will ensure that our new system of regulation, as it covers every aspect of casinos and other gambling premises—from advertising to checks on entry to controls on games and machines—will place public protection first.

Gulf Veterans: Mortality Data

Lord Drayson: My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Defence (Derek Twigg) has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	As part of the Government's continuing commitment to investigate Gulf veterans' illnesses openly and honestly, data on the mortality of veterans of the 1990-91 Gulf conflict are published regularly. The most recent figures for 1 April 1991 to 30 June 2007 were published on Friday 13 July 2007 as a national statistic on the Defence Analytical Services Agency website. Copies were also placed in the Library.
	The data for Gulf veterans are compared to that of a control group known as the "era cohort", consisting of Armed Forces personnel of a similar profile, in terms of age, gender, service, regular/reservists status and rank, who were in service on 1 January 1991 but were not deployed to the Gulf. As in the previous release, the era group has been adjusted for a small difference in the age-profile of those aged 40 years and over, to ensure appropriate comparisons.
	Key points to note in the data are:
	there have been 845 deaths among the Gulf veterans and 864 in the age-adjusted era comparison group; andthe 845 deaths among Gulf veterans compare with approximately 1,393 deaths which would have been expected in a similar sized cohort taken from the general population of the UK with the same age and gender profile. This reflects the strong emphasis on fitness when recruiting and retaining service personnel.
	These statistics continue to confirm that UK veterans of the 1990-91 Gulf conflict do not suffer an excess of overall mortality compared with service personnel who did not deploy.
	The full notice can be viewed at www.dasa.mod.uk

Health Select Committee: Audiology Services

Baroness Royall of Blaisdon: My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department of Health (Ivan Lewis), has made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	The Government have today laid before Parliament their response to the Health Select Committee report on audiology services (Cm 7140).
	The Government are responding to the conclusions and recommendations raised by the committee, covering issues such as the waiting times challenge in audiology services; service delivery, patient pathways and good practice; the use of the independent sector; and capacity.
	The Government's response is available in the Library.

Prisons: Population

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath: My right honourable friend the Minister of State (David Hanson) has today made the following Written Ministerial Statement.
	On 19 June 2007 (Official Report, House of Lords, col. 96) my noble and learned friend Lord Falconer of Thoroton, the then Lord Chancellor, announced a new scheme, the end of custody licence (ECL), which introduced a presumption in favour of release on licence for prisoners serving between four weeks and four years for the final 18 days of their sentence, subject to meeting strict eligibility criteria and providing a release address. Prisoners who would normally be subject to supervision on release (prisoners serving 12 months or more or under 22 years of age) are required to meet their probation officer after release and to have regular contact after that, in line with their supervision plan. All prisoners released on ECL are liable to recall if they are reported to have misbehaved during the period of the licence.
	The first releases under the scheme took place on 29 June 2007.
	Tables with the full set of data for this report have been made available in the Libraries, the Vote Office and the Printed Paper Office. The tables are being published on the Ministry of Justice website today at www.justice.gov.uk/publications/endofcustodylicence.htm
	The following information applies only to the releases and recalls in the first week of operation of the scheme, and future reports will be published monthly:
	between implementation of the ECL scheme on 29 June 2007 and 5 July 2007, there were 1,701 releases on ECL. Of these, 1,552 (91 per cent) were male and 149 (9 per cent) were female;the greatest number of releases was for offenders serving sentences for theft and handling, with 404 (24 per cent of all releases) coming from this offence group; and,1,412 (83 per cent) of releases were from sentences of less than 12 months, with the remaining 289 (17 per cent) from sentences of 12 months to less than four years.The number of releases on ECL each day are shown in the table:
	
		
			 Date Number of releases 
			 Friday 29 June 2007 884 
			 Monday 2 July 2007 506 
			 Tuesday 3 July 2007 124 
			 Wednesday 4 July 2007 87 
			 Thursday 5 July 2007 100 
		
	
	There were 30 notified decisions to recall between 29 June and 5 July. The most common reason for recall was the offender being out of touch with their supervising probation officer, with 11 (37 per cent) of recalls being for this reason.
	Any prisoners falling into the following categories are excluded from release on ECL:
	registered sex offenders, whether or not they are currently serving a sentence for a sexual offence;prisoners serving sentences for serious violence as specified in Prison Service Instruction 27/2007;prisoners who have previously escaped from custody;prisoners who have previously breached temporary release conditions during the current sentence, have offended during a period under temporary release at any time, or who are currently serving a sentence for failing to return from temporary release;prisoners who report that they do not have a release address;foreign national prisoners who will be subject to deportation at the end of their sentence; prisoners who are subject to extradition proceedings;sentenced prisoners who have been remanded into custody on further charges or who are awaiting sentence;prisoners who, within the period of their current sentence, had been recalled either from HDC or from normal licence;.prisoners under 18;prisoners serving DTO sentences; andprisoners required to undertake a treatment programme as a condition of the normal (end of sentence) supervision licence that could not be arranged during the period of ECL.
	The data presented in this Statement are drawn from the prison administrative IT systems. Although care is taken when processing and analysing the returns, the detail collected is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system. While the figures shown have been checked as far as practicable, they should be regarded as approximate and not necessarily accurate to the last whole number.
	
		
			 Table 1—ECL releases: by offence, sentence length, age, ethnic group and sex 
			  Males Females Total 
			 All ECL releases between 29 June 2007 and 5 July 2007 1,552 149 1,701 
			 By offence
			 Violence against the person (1) 317 27 344 
			 Robbery 22 2 24 
			 Burglary 148 1 149 
			 Theft and Handling 354 50 404 
			 Fraud and Forgery 31 6 37 
			 Drug offences 57 8 65 
			 Motoring offences 213 6 219 
			 Other offences 379 48 427 
			 Offence not recorded 31 1 32 
			 By sentence length
			 Less than or equal to six months 1,105 122 1,227 
			 Greater than six months to less than 12 months 171 14 185 
			 12 months to less than four years 276 13 289 
			 By age
			 18-20 216 17 233 
			 21-24 313 18 331 
			 25-29 356 38 394 
			 30-39 416 59 475 
			 40-49 193 13 206 
			 50-59 47 4 51 
			 60 and over 11 0 11 
			 By ethnic group
			 White 1,334 131 1,465 
			 Mixed 34 6 40 
			 Asian or Asian British 70 0 70 
			 Black or Black British 108 11 119 
			 Chinese or other ethnic group 4 1 5 
			 Not stated 1 0 1 
			 Unrecorded 0 0 0 
			 1991 Census ethnic codes 1 0 1 
			 (1) Excludes serious violent offences such as murder, manslaughter, wounding with intent to commit grievous bodily harm, possession of a firearm with intent to endanger life, child cruelty and serious explosives offences. A full list of exclusions can be found in Prison Service Instruction 27/2007. 
			 Data sources and quality: these figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems, which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing. See data sources and quality section of report for more information. 
		
	
	
		
			 Table 2—ECL releases by discharging establishment (1) 
			 Releases between 29 June and 5 July 2007 
			 Establishment Releases 
			 Males  
			 Altcourse 12 
			 Acklington 4 
			 Ashwell 4 
			 Aylesbury 1 
			 Belmarsh 18 
			 Buckley Hall 4 
			 Blundeston 2 
			 Bedford 41 
			 Brockhill 8 
			 Bristol 13 
			 Birmingham 40 
			 Bullingdon 25 
			 Brinsford 1 
			 Blakenhurst 50 
			 Bullwood Hall 6 
			 Brixton 13 
			 Chelmsford 34 
			 Cardiff 15 
			 Camp Hill 6 
			 Coldingley 1 
			 Castington 3 
			 Channings Wood 6 
			 Canterbury 5 
			 Dartmoor 3 
			 Durham 34 
			 Doncaster 61 
			 Dorchester 8 
			 Deerbolt 20 
			 Erlestoke 3 
			 Standford Hill 22 
			 Everthorpe 20 
			 Exeter 31 
			 Elmley 19 
			 Forest Bank 45 
			 Ford 17 
			 Featherstone 2 
			 Gloucester 16 
			 Guys Marsh 14 
			 Grendon (Spring Hill) 6 
			 Glen Parva 31 
			 Hollesley Bay (Warren 12 
			 Moorland Open 11 
			 Hewell Grange 9 
			 Holme House 31 
			 Hindley 3 
			 Hull 6 
			 Highdown 24 
			 Haverigg 15 
			 Kirkham 46 
			 Lancaster 6 
			 Leicester 14 
			 Leeds 41 
			 Lindholme 11 
			 Lincoln 15 
			 Liverpool 47 
			 Littlehey 1 
			 Lewes 9 
			 Leyhill 25 
			 Moorland 12 
			 Manchester 54 
			 Maidstone 1 
			 Edmunds Hill 21 
			 Nottingham 14 
			 Northallerton 28 
			 North Sea Camp 30 
			 Norwich 23 
			 Onley 20 
			 Peterborough 21 
			 Portland 15 
			 Preston 19 
			 Parc 38 
			 Pentonville 19 
			 Rochester 3 
			 Reading 8 
			 Ranby 28 
			 Risley 10 
			 Stafford 1 
			 Stoke Heath 26 
			 Stocken 4 
			 Swinfen Hall 3 
			 Sudbury 11 
			 Swansea 15 
			 Shrewsbury 14 
			 Thorn Cross 4 
			 Usk (Prescoed) 8 
			 Winchester 11 
			 Wealstun 5 
			 Woodhill 27 
			 Wayland 3 
			 Wymott 7 
			 Wolds 2 
			 Wormwood Scrubs 28 
			 Wandsworth 29 
			 Total 1,552 
			 Females  
			 Askham Grange 1 
			 Bronzefield 18 
			 Drake Hall 7 
			 Downview 6 
			 East Sutton Park 1 
			 Eastwood Park 16 
			 Foston Hall 17 
			 Holloway 17 
			 Low Newton 10 
			 Morton Hall 1 
			 New Hall 22 
			 Peterborough 16 
			 Send 2 
			 Styal 15 
			 Total 149 
			 Males and Females Total 1,701 
			 (1) Prisons not releasing any prisoners on ECL between 29 June and 5 July 2007 are not included in this breakdown. 
			 Data sources and quality: these figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems, which, as with any large-scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing. See data sources and quality section of report for more information. 
		
	
	
		
			 Table 3—ECL recalls by sentence length and reason for recall 
			 Decisions to recall between 29 June and 5 July 2007 
			 Decisions to recall as notified to NOMS 30 
			 By reason for recall  
			 Reoffended (1) 6 
			 Failed to reside (2) 6 
			 Out of touch (3) 11 
			 Poor behaviour (4) 7 
			 Number of offenders unlawfully at large on 5 July 2007 18 
		
	
	In addition, NOMS has been notified of one offender released a week earlier than his due ECL date of 5 July and two other prisoners now back in custody, having been recalled following release without appropriate authorisation.
	(1) The number of actual further offences committed, as notified to NOMS, is eight. This number is higher than that of recalls for reoffending, because offenders will sometimes commit/be charged with more than one offence and not all offences are identified while the offender is serving the period of ECL. Some offences will be identified and notified to NOMS after the offender has completed the period of ECL and is therefore not liable to be recalled.
	(2) The offender did not live, whether for one night or longer, at the address given on the ECL licence and which the governor had approved for the purpose of release on ECL.
	(3) The offender did not report on release or thereafter to his supervising probation officer as required by the conditions of the supervision licence. (This would apply to offenders serving sentences of 12 months or over and all those under 22 who are subject to supervision by the National Probation Service).
	(4) The offender has exhibited behaviour that indicates non-compliance, or a risk of reoffending or harm in respect of the conditions of the licence.
	Data sources and quality: all the figures above are as notified to NOMS and may therefore be subject to inaccuracies. There may be recalls, reoffending, further offences, offenders returned to custody and offenders release not in accordance with the scheme, some of which may not have been notified to us.